RSS Feeds/Using Google Reader

Our Tech Tuesday topic for October 6 was RSS Feeds/Google Reader.  Using this technology, you can get website and blog updates coming to you instead of going out to check all the websites you visit.  It's really similar to getting website updates in your inbox, but it's a separate program.  I use this as a professional learning tool and as a way to get news information, since I don't have much time to watch the news.

1. To get started, I would recommend using the Firefox web browser.  I'm not familiar with using Internet Explorer for this.  You can download Firefox here if you don't have it.

2. After you've done that, go to Google Reader and log in with your google user name and password.  Just stay logged in so your browser recognizes you're a Google user.

 3. Now, you can go to any website you'd like.  I've listed some blogs I recommend in my last post.  Once you're on the site, look to see if it has this symbol in the address bar:

 

 

 

If it does, click on it. It should give you some subscription options (RSS or Atom?)  Either one you pick is fine.

4. Then it should give you an option to subscribe with Google.  Do this, and then choose Google Reader.

 

 

 

 

 

 

5.  It should redirect you to Google Reader after you've subscribed.  Your sidebar will then have a list of the bogs/websites you're subscribed to as you add them.  

As you can see, I added Tech Tuesdays, so it's now there on my list (You can repeat this process for as many blogs/websites as you'd like.).

5.  To read through your website updates, you can choose all items, and scroll through them, or skip from one to the next using the "N" key.  You can also (if you have pop-ups enabled) click the "V" key to view the entry in a separate tab or window (depending on your browser settings).

 

 

If you'd like to just read the updates from a specific website, you can just click on that website's subscription and scroll through.  

6. If you're not sure what you'd like to subscribe to, here is a video from AndyWibbels.com on how to search for subscriptions in Google Reader.

If you have any further questions or need some help, please let me know!